Town Square

TV30 facing financial fight for its life

The four Tri-Valley mayors who have taken control of TV30, the area's pioneer and only independent community television system, may scuttle much of the live on-air programming, including its award-winning news show, to stop a continuing financial shortfall that has put the entire system at risk.

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Posted by Stacey
a resident of Amberwood/Wood Meadows
on Jan 11, 2008 at 8:35 am

It is sad to see this occurring with TV30. As a teen I got the opportunity to volunteer my time there as a camerawoman on one of the live shows. It kept me out of trouble in so-called "boring" Pleasanton and provided good experience. Perhaps some of that State "career tech" funding that is supposedly available and underutilized by our school district could be put towards high school programs at the station. I don't think it is a secret to anyone familiar with the operations at the station that Darla Stevens left big shoes to fill.

Other areas of concern:
- I question if it is really necessary to operate three channels.
- In some ways I think it is dangerous to have a public-access station operated by a city cover govt. news.

Posted by aaron
a resident of Highland Oaks
on Jan 11, 2008 at 1:05 pm

i like ctv, it has given an opportunity for alot of rop students to learn alot about television, media, and production, a very usefull tool, that helps people get the start to their future. they should have some type of telethon, i'm sure the community would come show support.

Posted by Annoyed in Livermore
a resident of Livermore
on Jan 12, 2008 at 1:51 pm

What other kind of writing on the wall do you need, to see that they are absolutely incapable of effectively choosing a solid leader for this channel? This isnt brain science, there are business models everywhere on how to run a tv station such as this. We [television] have been in business for over 60 years. What has happened at TV30 is toxic. Keeping the director in his position after losing money the first year was already a very poor choice, then keeping him after a sexual harassment suit was filed was an even poorer choice. Now the channel has lost an unreasonable amount of money and has a second law suit against the director. A third grade class could run this station better than these leaders have. These are the people who run your cities! You better get out there and vote vote vote for people who know how to protect the citizens money and value and our labor laws. I heard that the reporters at TV30 make considerably less per hour than ALL the other employees. I am an on camera performer and all I can say is "this is why we must have unions!"

Posted by viewer
a resident of Golden Eagle
on Jan 17, 2008 at 6:16 pm

I do know that the amount of money that TV30 gets per cable home has not been raised in 10 years. On top of that a lot more homes have a dish than 10 years ago and they don't pay for TV30 (not saying they should). Meanwhile ComCast has raised their charges three fold in the same 10 years.

I am not for increasing what ComCast charges customers, I am in favor of have more money from ComCast go to TV30 without raising customer fees. They are making plenty of money, call it community service expense for being allowed to do business in the valley.

And the news just isn't LOCAL anymore. We have KTVU if we want to want Bay Area-wide news. We have channel 30's news to focus on the Tri-Valley, and it's not doing that. It's all style, no substance.

There are also less volunteer opportunities at the station, and they take less advantage of the R.O.P. students than when I was there in the 90's. Us R.O.P. students used to run entire tapings. We gained experience that a high school student couldn't get anywhere else, they got free labor. That certainly helped offset staffing costs. Plus they used to air the R.O.P. programming regularly and people actually watched it: I even got recognized once!

If this what Channel 30 has and will continue to turn into, I'm fine to watch it go.

Otherwise channel 30 has to use more volunteers, R.O.P. students, and interns than Davis was permitting.

I also think they do NOT currently have a sales staff. As long as it's being run like a commercial station, they should staff it like one. There is ALWAYS a larger sales staff at a tv/radio station than production or news staff. In this case, the sales staff would just be selling underwriting instead of actual commercials.

The current management is just concerned about how sharp and professional everything looks, and that's pushing them into debt. The problem is, it's a COMMUNITY station, it's SUPPOSED to be low-budget... and that's why we like it.

In fact, they need to put the community back into "Tri-valley Community Television."

Oh yeah, and a response to "Annoyed in Livermore": TV30 reporters do NOT make less than everyone at the station. In fact, ever since Davis was named manager, they make a ridiculously HIGH wage for working their first job... at commmunity station notheless. Davis over-pays everyone else he hires himself as well, including the production staff (which is also too large for the station's size). When you get your first job in broadcasting, you're usually just excited to be working.

Can somedbody please cancel the "Downtown Livermore" show? You know.
The one witht the lady trying to get people to shop downtown.
It's dreadful. I would rather be subjected to someone's home movies than
watch that wretched program.